Sudan's military council calls on opposition to reopen talks

Sudan's paramilitary Rapid Support Forces soldiers greet people as they secure a site in Khartoum.

(Image credit: REUTERS/Umit Bektas)

published 19 June 2019

Sudan's ruling military council on Wednesday said that it is once again ready to continue talks with the country's opposition alliance.

Sudan has been mired in a struggle to transition to democracy after the military ousted longtime autocratic President Omar al-Bashir in April after 16 weeks of protests.

The negotiations between the military council and the civilian opposition collapsed following a violent dispersal of a protest camp in Khartoum earlier in June. Protesters said more than 100 people were killed, while authorities said the number of deaths was 61. The opposition alliance has said it refuses to engage with the military council until the initiation of an international inquiry into the violence, but the council is nevertheless trying to persuade them to meet without any preconditions.

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"The solution must be satisfactory for all the Sudanese people," Lieutenant General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan said in his statement directed at the opposition. "We pledge to you and pledge to the people that we will not accept any solution that excludes any faction of the Sudanese people." Burhan also reiterated the council's stance that they did not order the dispersal. Instead, the say that a campaign against criminals using an area near the camp "strayed from its course," Reuters reports. Read more at Reuters.

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Tim is a staff writer at The Week and has contributed to Bedford and Bowery and The New York Transatlantic. He is a graduate of Occidental College and NYU's journalism school. Tim enjoys writing about baseball, Europe, and extinct megafauna. He lives in New York City.

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